A WHALE OF A STORY Back to Sea Stories The Baja is unforgiving in the summer. Temperatures soar skywards, buzzards are very active, there are hurricanes running around and the sun doesn't rise, it bursts into flames. There are times however tragic, nature rewards those that endure the summers in the Baja. July 1993 was one such summer. The Port Captain of La Paz put out an urgent request for assistance to help save 15 sperm whales that had beached themselves on a sandbar directly in front of downtown La Paz. On the first day with the help of many people in boats and government agencies we made numerous attempts to pull these 13 ton animals off the sand bar and guide them out the narrow channel to open sea. Our attempts were futile, as soon as they were in the deep narrow channel they would immediately turn around and head for the sand bar. The tide was receding. It was decided to continue the effort the next morning. While keeping the whales wet with water that same afternoon, I decided to don a mask and look one of the whales directly in the eye. To my surprise I saw this huge eye looking back at me. The whale made these loud clicking noises as he watched me. Somewhere in the back of my mind I knew he was asking for help. I had communicated with another intelligent life form.  The next morning we were much more organized. It was decided to pull out the largest and the apparent leader of the pack first. Many small boats were asked to herd them out the channel to deep water. While herding our first whale (we were learning as we went) with my boat between the whale and the long sand bar, we noticed that when we placed my outboard in reverse and cavitated the propeller, the whale would not approach the sand bar, and would continue in the channel . We believe the noise kept him from communicating with the pod. Slowly we herded the animal to deep water. In one instance as we were in deep water, the whale sounded, then returned to the surface close to us and flicked it's tail at us and sounded , not to be seen again. As if saying thank you and good-bye. We were able to free all the whales, however a few days later two were found on the beach of the outer bay. Obviously they had sustained internal damage while in shallow water due to their weight. Boone Camp....... July 1996 ....... La Paz, B.C.S. Mexico Copyright©1999  Boone Camp/ All rights reserved  Back to Sea Stories